Microstructural and electrical investigation of polymorph stabilization and multistate transition in interface engineered epitaxial VO2 films

•Some of the key features of the work presented here are:•Use of in-situ characterizations techniques like XRD, EBSD, Raman spectroscopy to study the MIT behaviour and intermediate polymorph stabilization.•Study of different device architectures to investigate interface effect on electrical measurements and mapping M2 polymorph presence through two step electrical transition.•Use of DFT calculation to study effect of misfit strain from substrate on structural and electronic properties of M1 and R polymorph. As M1 and R have different structure, thus the strain experienced before and after transition on the same substrate will be different. Using orientation relation of PLD grown films, we predict the transition temperature to validate our electrical measurements.